renewable energy in zaanstad: from theory to practice - e-harbours

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Zaanstad is a Dutch municipality located in the region North-Holland with 143.000 inhabitants. The
municipality has set the ambitious goal of being a CO2 neutral municipality by 2020. Zaanstads
reasons for this transition are global warming, depletion of fossil fuels, security of energy supply and
providing a healthy environment for its residents.
The total energy consumption within its municipal boundaries currently is estimated at 11.1 PJ/year.
The energy consumption by Zaanstad exists for a large part out of natural gas (49%), transport fuels
(28%) and electricity (21%). Several investigations have been done of how Zaanstad can achieve its
goals. First of all, the energy consumption needs to be reduced. Energy can be saved in the building
environment and in the local industries. By applying hard measures in these sectors, Zaanstad can
reduce its energy demand to 9.2 PJ/year. This amount of energy needs to be generated locally with
renewable generation.
Research has shown that in theory the most suitable renewable energy sources for Zaanstads energy
plans are biomass, solar energy, wind energy and geothermal energy. The investigations has shown
that biomass in theory has a lot of potential. In practice however, most of the biomass already other
has destinations. Zaanstad needs to negotiate with local companies in other to make biomass a
suitable candidate for its energy plans. Zaanstad is planning to invest in renewable distributed
generation on a large scale. This includes an investment of 76 MWp in PV cells and an investment of
74 MW in wind turbines. The energy production by these generators together is estimated at 2.9 PJ
per year. Since the current electricity consumption of Zaanstad is 2.4 PJ per year, the renewable
energy sources will cover the electricity demand. Nevertheless an increase of electricity is expected
because of the increasing population and the increase of electric vehicles and heat pumps. For the
replacement of natural gas as a heat supplier by a renewable energy sources, geothermal energy is
an important candidate (besides biomass). In the northern region deep geothermal energy can be
used for spatial heating. The availability of deep geothermal energy in the area of Krommenie and
Wormerveer is 5.9 PJ/km 2 . In the southern region of Zaanstad can use ATES or BTES systems in
combination with ground source heat pumps. Further research needs to be done on the possibility of
the practical implementation and financial aspects of these techniques in Zaanstad.
The implementation of renewable energy in Zaanstad requires a change in the current energy
infrastructure. For the heat supply a district heating network needs to be installed in order to realize
the possibility to connect biomass CHP units and geothermal energy techniques to this system. Also
the electricity infrastructure needs to be reviewed closely in order to realize Zaanstads plans. The
large scale implementation of distributed generators as PV and wind turbines can have a negative
impact on the distribution grid in terms of grid reliability and power quality. Further research needs
to be done in this subject. If possible problems and bottlenecks are identified, the addition of Smart
Grid techniques to Zaanstads network should be investigated. The implementation of Smart Grid
techniques can reduce the impact on the distribution network. Zaanstad is currently developing a
Smart Grid pilot project called REloadIT, which is the showcase of the European project e-harbours in
which Zaanstad is leading partner.
The REloadIT project is a step towards a possible future Smart Grid in Zaanstad. In order to realize a
Smart Grid rollout over the whole municipality, further research needs to be done. If Zaanstads
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